JIM SILLARS revealed his manifesto for an independent Scotland yesterday as he told Labour voters they need to say Yes to get the government they really want.

The nationalist heavyweight believes left-leaning voters could deliver a socialist Labour government in 2016 but have to vote for independence first.

In a book published this week, he describes a Scotland with its own currency, full employment, higher pensions and homes for all.

Speaking to the Sunday Mail, he said the country could be run by a Scottish Labour Party who have rediscovered their socialist roots and he urged voters not to confuse a vote for independence with a vote for SNP leader Alex Salmond.

He added: “I give Alex all the credit he deserves for bringing us to this point and there is no doubt he is head and shoulders above most MSPs at Holyrood.

“But Alex is mortal and Scotland is immortal. We have to get over to people, principally Labour supporters, that a Yes vote does not endorse Alex.

“It would give him a shot at being prime minister of Scotland but if people don’t want him, they don’t have to have him.”

Sillars, 76, has been a Labour and SNP MP in a Westminster career spanning three decades, as well as deputy leader of the SNP.

He has come out of retirement to write a book which he hopes will inspire a political debate that he fears has been “as flat as a pancake”. Sillars describes In Place Of Fear II as a “socialist programme for an independent Scotland”.

The 108-page manifesto is inspired by the 1952 book In Place Of Fear by Labour politician Nye Bevan, the architect of the NHS.

Sillars, married to independent MSP Margo MacDonald, said: “I have 10 grandchildren and I don’t see any future for them in a UK that is skint.

Original book In Place of Fear (Image: DAVID McNIE PHOTOGRAPHY)

“The recovery is false and is based on the same conduct that got us in trouble before, which is a massive government debt of £1.5trillion and massive consumer debt which stands at £1.4trillion.

“The Chancellor appears to be happy if the economy appears to recover on that bubble of debt until after the 2015 general election.

“People are not aware that so far we’ve only had £1 in every £10 of cuts promised by the Tories. The rest is coming after 2015 and it will fall upon the poor. The bedroom tax will look like a gift from Santa Claus.

“I forecast that if No wins this referendum, by 2016 most of the people who voted No will bitterly regret it.

“I will have to tell my grandchildren to get the best qualifications and be prepared to get out – Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the traditional escape routes for Scots. And that applies to everyone’s grandchildren.

“I don’t want to see my daughters on Christmas Eve with tears streaming down because their grandchildren are phoning them from thousands of miles away. I want them to be in Scotland and helping to make Scotland a very prosperous country. But they can only do that if we vote Yes for independence.”

He added: “There is no excitement in Scotland about this referendum. The No side’s strategy has been to depress the vote for independence with a fear campaign because people are afraid.

“It is no accident we’re afraid. We are told we are too wee and poor. If you listen to the No side, there is nothing we are capable of. You get the impression we are the most useless people on God’s earth. The No message is, ‘Leave us alone and we’ll make a mess of it.’

“And, to a large extent, they have succeeded so far because support for the Yes side has hardly moved.”

Sillars voiced disappointment with the SNP’s White Paper charting their vision of independence, saying it is too safe and circumspect and lacking in vision.

He said: “The impression I get from the White Paper is that the country would become a competent mini UK. We’d keep the Queen, keep the pound and go into a currency union. Where is the difference? It doesn’t set the heather on fire.

“Any life in the White Paper was sucked out by the civil servants. It was supposed to be as eloquent as the Declaration of Arbroath and it is the very opposite. People pick it up and groan, ‘Do I have to read 670 pages?’”

Sillars was elected to Westminster in 1970 as a Labour MP for South Ayrshire. But he created a breakaway Labour party in 1975 in protest over Jim Callaghan’s dithering over devolution.

He was deselected by Labour and lost his seat in 1979. He subsequently joined the SNP, winning the Govan by-election in 1988.

He said: “I am a socialist, always have been. I left the Labour Party, I didn’t leave socialism.

“I have had my belief in socialism renewed as I have examined this capitalist system where there is a lot of care for the rich and nothing but struggle for the poor.

“I believe a contribution from a sensible socialist perspective is required, particularly for Labour voters. It is the Labour voters who will determine Yes or No for Scotland.

“The hardcore SNP vote, the Scottish Socialist Party and the Green vote come nowhere near the level required for a Yes vote, so the Yes vote is in the hands of Labour supporters.

“These are people I have had an affinity with since I was a boy, when my father danced in the streets when Labour won in 1945 and I realised something significant had happened.

“I am talking to people who are the same as me. I have a middle-class house and a middle-class lifestyle but if you press me on any issue, I am a working-class socialist.

“I have written a book that tries to tell those folk that power lies in their hands on September 18 and they can transform their living and wage standards by electing a Labour government who have refound their socialist compass.

“Labour in Scotland will be renewed with a Yes vote. No longer will they have to worry about looking over their shoulder where Labour in England are after the Middle England vote.”

Sillars also suggested that a negotiating committee from all parties could make a deal with Westminster on the break-up of Britain.

He said: “There are a lot of Scottish Labour MPs at Westminster who are very talented and experienced in international affairs. If Scotland votes Yes, we should tap into that talent. They are not enemies, they are our fellow citizens.”

But Sillars insists he doesn’t want a role in the creation of an independent Scotland.

He said: “I am 76. My grandchildren matter to me more than anything else. It will be the young people who will carry independence forward.”

Jim Sillars’ book, In Place Of Fear II, is available at www.inplaceoffear.com